Be Careful What You Wish For Read online

“Cookies,” she shouted at Rory. “Run to the kitchen and get some cookies. We’ll lure him off the table that way.”

  “Got it!” Rory headed off, pushing through the crowd in the direction of the kitchen while Cass continued to try and get the clone to come down off the table. Her efforts were unsuccessful, however, until Rory returned with a plateful of Oreos.

  “Cookies!” her sister shouted enticingly. “Hey Brandon, don’t you want some nice cookies?”

  “Cookies?” The clone stopped bumping and grinding and came closer to the edge of the table. “Me like cookies!”

  “Here they are. Come and get them…” Rory held an Oreo out to him enticingly. “Come on, sweetie, come to Rory.”

  “Cookies!” The clone jumped off the table like a naked Tarzan and reached for the cookie.

  “Quick,” Cass shouted as the mob of angry Trekkies began to converge on the naked clone. “Lead him upstairs! I’ll hold off the crowd.”

  This, however, proved to be easier said than done. The drunken mob of costumed women didn’t want to be held off. They pushed past Cass and would have followed Rory and the cookie-hungry clone right up the stairs if Nana’s new boyfriend hadn’t intervened.

  “ta’ ghobe’ ‘el jaH DoH!” he shouted angrily, spreading his arms to block the foot of the stairs.

  “I think that means ‘go back’ or ‘get away’ in Klingon,” Nana said helpfully in Cass’s ear.

  “Right, thanks for the translation,” Cass said dryly. “Exactly how long is this little party of yours going to go on for, anyway, Nana?”

  “I don’t know.” Nana bit her lip. “Honestly, I had no idea it would be this elaborate. I thought we were just having a few other people in costume over to play bridge. I didn’t know there was a dress code and a whole new language to learn when Hrak asked if his group could have a little get together here.”

  “Well I think it’s time you sent everyone home,” Cass said, ducking under the swarthy Hrak’s arm to follow Rory and the clone up the stairs. “Things are getting out of hand, Nana.” Which wasn’t unusual when it came to Nana and men, actually. But still, enough was enough.

  “Oh dear, maybe you’re right.” Nana looked troubled. “And we didn’t even get to play that game of Trek Twister Hrak was telling me about.”

  Cass didn’t even want to imagine her spry but elderly grandmother playing twister in the tiny blue minidress she was wearing. Especially not with the swarthy man who was still shouting in Klingon at the drunken conventioneers.

  “Just get rid of them,” she said. “And maybe ask a few more details about the ‘little get together’ before you approve another one.”

  Then she turned and raced up the stairs, hoping to get the Brandon clone locked away again before any more mischief could occur.

  Nineteen

  “Whew!” Rory sank down on Cass’s bed with a weary sigh. In the corner, the Brandon clone was crouched nude, gobbling cookies. Cass was in her closet changing into something more comfortable than the rumpled skirt and blouse she’d fallen asleep in.

  “Thanks for your help,” she said to Rory when she emerged from the closet in a comfortable pair of yoga pants and an old t-shirt. “I never would have gotten him back up here without you.”

  “No problem.” Rory sighed glumly. “It’s not like I have anything else to do on a Friday night. Unless I want to go down and join Nana’s little party. Which I do not.”

  Cass made a sympathetic face at her little sister. “No plans for the weekend? I thought you said you might go out with that cute guy from the kennel where you volunteer.”

  “Marty? Yeah, he asked me out.” Rory shook her head. “I told him no.”

  “Why’d you do that?” Cass demanded. “I thought you liked him.”

  “I do. Just not as much as…” Rory sighed. “Just not enough to go out with him, I guess.” She made a visible effort to brighten up. “But what about you? What are your plans for the weekend?”

  “I’m still trying to get ready for my I.C.U. showing.” Cass felt herself deflating. “Which is going to be cancelled for sure now since I can’t paint anymore without whatever I’m painting coming to life and jumping off the page. I’m minus my main showpiece and there’s no way to make a new one.”

  “Wait a minute,” Rory said. “What exactly did you wish? Was it to get more life in your art or in your painting?”

  “In my painting,” Cass said after a minute. “Yes, I’m almost sure that was it. But what does that have to do with anything?”

  “You know how specific the FG’s magic is. If you said you wanted life in your painting, that should be the only thing that’s affected. And who says you have to paint your showpiece anyway?” Rory demanded. “You do lots of other kinds of art, don’t you?”

  “You’re right—I do!” Cass gave her sister a quick hug. “What a relief! I thought I was going to have to give up art until Jake got this whole mess with the FG straightened out.”

  Rory beamed. “You could sculpt a statue. Or—”

  “Too time consuming,” Cass interrupted. “I’d never get it ready in time.” But her little sister’s idea had her thinking. It was true she didn’t have time to sculpt something and she couldn’t paint, but what was to stop her from using some other medium? She could do a portrait of Brandon in oil pastels—that wasn’t paint, right?

  Of course, it would mean starting all over again but now that she had the clone, she didn’t have to rely on the real Brandon to pose. She could set up a canvas and work all night with her subject right in front of her. “Yes,” she muttered to herself. “It just might work…”

  “What might work?” Rory asked, frowning.

  “This.” Cass was already setting up a new canvas and pulling out her pastels. “Do you think we could lure him a little closer?” she asked Rory. “Are there any more cookies downstairs?”

  “Yeah, I’ll get some.” Rory left and came back shortly with a brand new package of Oreos. “Here, they were buy one get one at Publix. But you owe me.”

  “Thanks, sis.” Cass smiled at her gratefully. “Now let me see if I can just get him into position.” She waved a cookie under the Brandon clone’s nose. “Come on, sweetie. Just come sit over here…”

  The clone had finished the other cookies and was willing to be lured. He sat on the stool Cass indicated and began eating the new pack of Oreos.

  “Perfect!” Cass picked out one of her larger pastels and began to sketch.

  “Well, I’d stick around and talk to you but you’re getting that look in your eyes which means you’re going into a creative fog nothing can penetrate,” Rory remarked.

  “Huh?” Cass looked up, frowning. “What did you say?”

  “Never mind.” Her little sister sighed. “I’ll see you later, okay?”

  “Fine. Thanks again.” Cass barely heard the door to her bedroom shut as she went happily back to her sketching.

  But her creative high didn’t last for long. Just as she was getting a good likeness, the Brandon clone ran out of cookies. And just like the real Brandon, when one appetite was satisfied, he turned to gratifying another.

  “Okay, doing really well here. Just perfect. Just…” Cass looked up from her canvas and the words died on her lips as she saw what the clone was up to. From the side of her bed, which often doubled as her laundry hamper, he had grabbed a pair of her best silk panties and was rubbing them against his crotch. He looked up at Cass with a crooked grin on his purple mouth.

  “Pretty. Feels good.”

  “Hey!” Cass shouted. “Hey, stop that, you nasty thing!” Pretty underwear was her one girly indulgence and she didn’t intend to let the clone ruin one of her favorite pairs by humping a hole in them. “Give those back!”

  She lunged at the clone which leaped nimbly back, still clutching the panties to his immense erection. “Pretty! Mine!” he insisted.

  “They are not yours. Those cost me an arm and a leg at Victoria’s Secret. You stop molesting them right no